Self improvement

It was a glorious 9 degrees outside this morning and I hope I can say that Spring is finally here.

The girls were both excited about the sunny skies and went outside with out their coats on. However it turned out to be quite windy and the breeze isn't warm enough yet to allow that.



They both wore their new dresses and looked very neat and prim. Isabel wore hers yesterday as well and received a few compliments on the dress.

I confess that is one of my favourite parts of sewing for the girls. The comments. No matter how simple a garment you've made, if people know you made it they are automatically impressed.
I never fish for comments though, but the girls are usually very proud of their new clothes and aren't afraid to tell people "Mommy made this!"

I also get a bit frustrated sometimes when people compliment and think that I'm being bashful when I focus on what I could have done better. They think it's false modesty, but I feel I'm at a point now where my results sometimes should be better.
I see the mistakes and the fudging I made but other people don't.



I've stopped pointing out my mistakes and I just soak up the praise but still I know I can do better.
For instance on this dress the collars aren't really to my liking. They stretch in a funny way as if one side is too short somehow. (And of course it doesn't show in a picture because I make sure to make adjustments before photographing it)
I still love the result it's just that after making so many collars I should do better.

Ah well. I'll keep practising and we'll see where it gets me.

Finally!

I've been waiting for my Lisette patterns for over a week. Normally I get a notice in the mail box telling me to pick stuff up if they can't deliver in our mailbox, or if I get slammed with customs I get a notice telling me to pick it up and pay.

Today I got a slip in the mail *reminding* me to pick up a package at the usual pick-up place.
Only I never got the first slip telling me it was there!

So I go to the store to fetch the package and the slip they usually leave in the mailbox is still there! On the envelope! Newbies.

Oh, and there was something weird with the customs declaration too. I think I've been overcharged...

Vintage flair

Well, here's the finished result. Two pretty Jump Rope Dresses for two pretty girls.

They picked the fabric themselves and I added the white pindot fabric for the plackets and collars because the fabric had a vintage flair to it and I thought the white plackets would add to that retro feeling.



This is the contented smile of my 6 year old getting to try on her new dress for real for the first time.



And here's my 3 year old showing her dress off. She does this easiest by dancing.

Sewing information: Fabric bought at Stoff och Stil, 100 % cotton.

Pink dress: Oliver + S Jump Rope Dress size 8 graded to a size 9-ish, placket lengthened 1", bodice lengthened 1", skirt lengthened 2".
Blue dress: Oliver + S Jump Rope Dress size 6 - no modifications.

Practice makes perfect

When setting out to make the Jump Rope Dresses for the girls I was a bit (very) intimidated by the plackets. It looked like it would be difficult and hard to get it to look good.



I made a few test runs since I had to make toiles for Isabel anyway, and it was a lot easier than I thought. Not simple and easy-peasy, but certainly not as fiddly as I had feared.



The cotton I bought for the dresses was fairly flimsy, and the pin dot fabric I chose for the collars and plackets was very thin.
I used a thin fusible cotton interfacing (which I didn't preshrink - fingers crossed it won't shrink!) on the placket and it turned out to be just enough.



Both plackets turned out well and I'm more than pleased with them.

I have some experience with sewing by now, but I have to put down a lot of the success to Liesl's excellent instructions.

The dresses are all but done now, I have to sew in buttons but one of the buttons shattered when I tried to sew it in with my machine and I only had the exact number of buttons. So I have to find new ones.

I will definitely make more of these for Spring!

Random shoes

I'm sporting my new sneakers today.

I had red high top Converse when I was a teenager and I love the look of them, but I haven't had proper sneakers since.

But on Saturday I drove to town to buy a pair. They are a bit tight still, and I think my feet will hate me tonight, but I love, love, love them.

TGIF!

Well, good morning!

I'm feeling slightly more rested today, but TGIF all the same.

Last night I checked Twitter and saw a tweet from Liesl of Oliver + S-fame. She was selling precut bundles of her new fabric line in her webshop.

I had to take a look of course and came away with two bundles. I think the latter of the two is my favourite and I hope to make an Ice Cream dress for Sofia from it. And I hope Isabel will want something from the reds.

We watched Doctor Who last night and it was so sad. We're up to the Human Nature/Family of Blood episodes and it was so heart wrenching to see the agony The Doctor felt when he had to change back to being a Time Lord. The episode was flawless in every way, script, filming, acting.

Tonight we're watching Blink which I have heard so much about (please don't spoil it for me if you've seen it).

I also finished up the bodices of the girls' Jump Rope Dresses - sorry no pictures yet, I haven't had time to upload them from the camera.
I hope I can finish them this afternoon. I pick the girls up early so maybe I can convince them to play upstairs so I can start on the skirts at least.
I really need to get some shopping done too so I plan to leave early and get it done before I pick them up. While I'm at the store I'm picking up some packages from Amazon I've been waiting for.

I'm eagerly awaiting my Lisette patterns as well. They were shipped over a week ago so they should arrive soon.

Tomorrow I hope we can get some laundry done and take a trip to town. I need to buy new shoes and a bra or two.

Relief

I bought two tickets in this raffle. Go join! She raised over $3000 in less than 24 hours.
The prize is really cool too.

I was watching live images from Japan on Friday and it's just all so surreal.
It's almost the same feeling I got on 9/11 when one thing happened after the other and it all felt like a bad action movie.
Well, this feels like a bad and over-the-top disaster movie.

Watching the live footage as the waters rushed in over land, seeing busses and cars driving to get away and realising that this is people dying *right now*, I'm watching and I can do absolutely nothing about it. It's a horrible feeling.
Not to mention all the troubles they are having with their nuclear power plants. Looks like a break cannot be caught there.

I'm old enough to remember the Chernobyl-accident in 1986. I live in Sweden and we had radiation reports on tv for months after. There are areas in northern Sweden that were quarantined and berry picking and mushroom picking there was prohibited for years.
This is a completely different situation, mostly because the power plants produce power via different methods.
But it's also different because there are so many reactors affected, and reading the news is hard because it's difficult to determine was news sources are reporting correctly and what sources are just out to scare me. Here is one article that I found slightly reassuring.
But then things have changed since.

I keep thinking about the heroes working to regain control over the power plants and I admire theirs and their families' sacrifice. Even though I'm working and getting on with my life, they are in the back of my mind at all time.